Spain will hold its parliamentary elections, once every four years, Sunday, with some 35.1 million voters electing the 350 members of the Congress of Deputies and 208 of the Senate's 264 members.
The following are some key facts about the country.
Spain has a total area of 505,925 square kilometers. Separated from the rest of Europe by the high barrier of the Pyrenees, it makes up the Iberian peninsula with Portugal to the west.
Among its 45.1 million people, most speak the main official language Castilian Spanish, while 30 percent also speak one of the three official regional languages of Catalonia, the Basque Country and Galicia.
The majority of Spaniards are Roman Catholic, but there is also a small Muslim population.
Madrid, its capital, has some 3.1 million residents.
Spain is divided into 17 autonomous regions, each having its own governments with varying degrees of autonomy.
Its economy, the tenth largest in the world, depends largely on farming, industry and tourism.
In 2007, Spain's gross domestic product (GDP) reached 1,049 billion euros (1,605 billion U.S. dollars). Its unemployment rate stood at 8.6 percent by the end of 2007.
Spain is a member of the United Nations, the European Union, the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation, and the World Trade Organization. It has implemented the Schengen Agreement.
In the last four years, Spain has been governed by the socialist Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero, who is seeking a new mandate.
Source: Xinhua
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